Moravské knihovny na počátku dvacátého století : sociální, pedagogické a kulturněpolitické souvislosti

• Title in English: Moravian libraries at the beginning of the twentieth century : social, pedagogical and cultural-political contexts
• Authors: ČERNÝ Michal
• Year of publication: 2018
• Type: Appeared in Conference without Proceedings
• MU Faculty or unit: Faculty of Arts
• Description: The development of libraries and librarianship, as a wider social phenomenon, has been connected in the Moravian environment approximately with the middle of the 19th century. By this time, libraries have a largely private character - they serve specific educational institutions or individuals, reflecting both their size and the structure of the fund, as well as access to library work itself. This certainly does not mean that there is no possibility of the use of libraries by the wider public, or the permeability and accessibility of individual works to selected persons. However, until the middle of the 19th century, libraries play primarily the private role of certain cultural or scientific infrastructures, which are to a certain extent exclusive in character. The development of the industrial revolution, as well as political and societal changes, have in turn put pressure on libraries to participate to a certain extent in the education and cultivation of the population, at least in two key areas. It is from the aforementioned half of the 19th century that a number of places in Moravia are experiencing increasing national tension and the availability of quality literature, which can participate in forming the idea of nationality (whose factual constitution is also associated with the 19th century) or national myth. It is important that Czech readers gain access to Czech literature to the widest extent, not because of ignorance of German but in the context of building a certain cultural and social climate. But it has to be said that the same policy is being done by the German-speaking monarchy citizens. The second aspect was connected with the necessity of education outside the formal education system - technical changes, but also the social conditions necessarily required the development of new skills and competences of citizens that the school could not prepare for. In the second half of the century, libraries also played the role of some of the first institutions of lifelong learning, which is crucial for their development in subsequent periods. This dichotomy of libraries - as places of science and technology on the one hand and socially or politically engaged culture and art on the other hand - is present in libraries until today, with varying shades or emphases largely determining the entire discourse of library work. In the period under review, libraries are gradually established, both in large cities and smaller municipalities. Until 1919, even some decentralization in libraries, which are often small and in abundant numbers outside the largest cities, can even be said. An example is Břeclav, which at the end of the 19th century had four libraries, but they did not have a total of two thousand volumes.